A/N: yes, yes I know I shouldn't be writing another fic but I was looking at Dokuga and they had an "inheritance" challenge, so this one shot was born. Enjoy!
Inheritance. The genetic characters transmitted from parent to offspring, taken collectively, good or bad and tend to dictate creatures actions. That, at least, was the logical definition. Inheritance is not limited to a biological level, though.
It can take many forms.
When Sesshomaru contemplated the attributes he had inherited from his foolish but powerful father, and his distant mother, a plethora of words and titles came to him.
Some told and taught to him since he was but a pup, gullible to the manipulation by his mother and his father's subjects. Others screamed in pleadings for mercy and spat by enemies who soon met their end.
Lord, Prince of dogs, conqueror, all powerful, and killing perfection.
Of course his father was never there, just a mere orbiting moon shining light upon him when it was not hiding behind clouds.
Soon, he was convinced of his station in life, his entitlement to anything he so desired, of his luck of being born into such a prestigious family.
It was laughable, that he was lucky.
Of course he kept this sentiment to himself and his thoughts, silence prevailing him wherever he went in fear of a flicker of emotion across his face would earn him punishment.
Of course he got older and more powerful, learning to wield the blood of his inheritance. Power soon became an idiosyncrasy to him, second natured.
Outgrowing the fear of his pup hood, he soon devoted himself to outgrowing something else-or rather someone else: His father.
It became a burning need, to prove himself to his father. First it started with beating his father's sniveling subjects in battles of wit, and then later escalated to physical battles.
Still then, when all was said and done his father would just calmly smile at him like he was a child that simply did not understand, that infuriating him the most. Many a forest was destroyed because of that.
When his sire met the future mother of his disgrace, the need to prove himself to his father became dark and ugly. It convoluted from innocent seeking of approval, to a need to prove that he was not his wild and uncontrollable father who did not abide by the rules of inheritance and the responsibility that came with it. He watched the slow rot of his fathers rule; subjects became questioning and more daring in their remarks.
The inconsolable rage came only a few short months later, when the little wailing scar upon his families honor was birthed by the conniving mortal wench. His fathers death, disguised in a little fleshy body with telling Hanyou features.
His name is Inuyasha.
He has inherited father's passion-filled gaze, brash behavior and most of all, his love for weak mortals. What it is that drives them to love something that could never bear strong fruit, which could never be satisfying intellectually nor physically?
I, of course, bear no such weakness. I am above that particular inheritance.
When I sought out a newly awakened Inuyasha, I looked to his side to see the cause of his revived nuisance in my life.
A human teenaged female stood defiantly next to the Hanyou, possessing wild ebony hair that curled and grabbed at her above average visage. She bore the brown eyes inherited by most of humankind, but the look of them was something different. Brown swirled with intense passion and discernment.
She looked into my face with a deliberate intention of catching my gaze and relayed her opinions loud and clear to my person.
She would rise above her inheritance, be stronger than any human I had known of since Midoriko, she would fight with a marriage of cunning and vehemence, and yet possess a capacity for sympathy and empathy that could have never been inherited from such a basic race.
So I wait and watch for a mistake that only her human inheritance could cause and I find one; her heart. Her heart lends her the weakness of love and the capacity to be hurt more than any mortal wound. Somehow I find that I cannot fault her for this inheritance though. For she turns this weakness into a strength which has defeated enemy time and time again.
Through many battles with the horrendous hanyou, Naraku, I cannot help but respect the little miko. How she strives to learn her inherited priestess abilities instead of relying on Inuyasha. Not one thing about this human followed the rules of inheritance and the more I contrived to find an attribute about her that followed those rules, the more intrigued I felt with the enigma known as Kagome.
I had fought and proved that I could defy inheritance, that it did not dictate who I was and who I thought myself to be. I thought my knowledge rested upon truth, but it perhaps also rests upon error. I find that the more time I spend with this not-yet woman, the more I am privy to the weakness of the heart. As I caress her cheek under the silver light of the moon, I cannot help but think that inheritance itself does not dictate who we are, but how we choose to utilize what we are given molds our character.
